Wednesday, July 19, 2006

Apartheid Britain

An apartheid society existed in early Anglo-Saxon Britain, research suggests.

Scientists believe a small population of migrants from Germany, Holland and Denmark established a segregated society when they arrived in England.

The researchers think the incomers changed the local gene pool by using their economic advantage to out-breed the native population...

"An initially small invading Anglo-Saxon elite could have quickly established themselves by having more children who survived to adulthood, thanks to their military power and economic advantage.

"We believe that they also prevented the native British genes getting into the Anglo-Saxon population by restricting intermarriage in a system of apartheid that left the country culturally and genetically Germanised."

12 Comments:

This is all part of the BBC's ravenous hunger to prove that British people aren't really British, so there's really nothing to feel proud of.

One thing they never take into account when they try to deconstruct our uniqueness is, how did we build the largest empire the world has ever known, and not only dismantle it with, over all, good grace, but invited our former colonies to stay in our family as members of the Commonwealth?

How did we start the Industrial Revolution? Why were we, on a tiny island in the North Sea, until the rise of America, for so many hundreds of years the most powerful - and most inventive - nation the world has ever known?

America, whose roots are British, has donned our mantle, and that is in the nature of things. Butwe certainly had a run for our money.

The BBC is such a hearty supporter of the destruction of Britain and the British that I cannot understand how the British do not demand that it be dismantled. They are paying to be told that hordes of primitive immigrants have a right to be in the country their ancestors built and fought for for 2,000 years.

Yes it is pretty much rubbish really. These tests are very unreliable as they rarely take into account the Black Death which could have significantly altered the genetic population of this country in an unpredictable way.Seen other so called tests of this nature which have given the opposite result.Additionally, the presence of 'Celtic' women found with Anglo-Saxon husbands at grave sites, and the presence of dual place-names dotted around England e.g. Penhill, which joins two words, one native and another A-S both meaning 'hill', again shows that the interaction between the two peoples was probably better than the detractors would have us think.As an example of a conquering invaders behaviour, the Normans shut themselves up in their motte and baileys, afraid of the English population which hated them. Completely different to the behaviour of the A-S.

There's a few leaps of logic there but one in particular stands out. There is no implicit link between having economic power and producing more children. Indeed it has been a parennial complaint that the poor out outbreeding the rich. See Prince Philip for recent examples.

I don't think the article is designed to prove the British aren't "British" as much as to delegitimise the non-Celtic people. The latter are a designated victim group who are woven into a noble savage mythology. The former are exposed as xenophobic and greedy right from the start. In this theory, the Imperialism began, not when Ireland, Scotland or Wales was incorporated into a "United Kingdom" but much earlier when the invasion of the Celtic paradise began.

anonymous 1:26 p.m., I see your point but the way it was presented by the BBC, it is all done in malice cloaked in a concern for historical accuracy, to destroy Britons' idea of ourselves and our country.

"So what's the explanation for Cheddar Man and his descendants popping up in Cheddar?"

Exactly. I don't believe it is so much the BBC at fault here as the man who is pushing this theory. From earlier reports he's written it becomes clear that he is determined to present the A-S in as bad a light as possible.